If Tali were to imagine what it is that Highever Keep looked like after Howe's men washed over it, it would be what they find in Redcliffe. The walk down into the valley is an agonizingly long one, and Alistair is happy to remain at the back of their group with Talvinder rather than retaking his place at the front. The first clue that something is wrong is the makeshift fortification set on the road to the windmill down from the castle bridge—which is barricaded by a large portcullis, barricaded and silent. It does not bode well.
Savreen's face, intent and focused before this sight, quickly turns grim. Morrigan scowls nervously, and Ranjit steps up closer towards Sav.
"We should watch our step," suggests Sten, the words so plain and obvious, but in a tone that would make even a stone sentinel loathe to point that out. Beside him, Leliana nods before turning sharply at the sight of something. She approaches the portcullis lever with trepidation, reaching out a single finger to swipe at a dark, glistening liquid on its surface. Tali realizes only when Leliana pulls that finger back, touches it to her thumb, stretching the viscous substance between the two digits, that it's blood. Old and clotted, but not yet old enough to dry. Or perhaps there is simply too much of it to dry fully. Leliana turns to the others, her gaze hard.
"If we cannot leave now," she suggests, eyeing the others pointedly, "we must be careful."
"I think Sten just made that point, Sister." Alistair's voice is tense, not quite argumentative but still with the distinct implication that such repetition is unnecessary. The road down into the village they traverse in silence, hands on daggers and swords and makeshift weapons in the case of Ranjit and Sten. Abarie and Sher both prick their ears, noses quivering as they look rapidly at any sign of movement around them. Everywhere Tali looks close enough, everywhere her gaze lingers for more than a few brief seconds, she can see the evidence of struggle and battle. Unease grows in the pit of her stomach, and rather than just resting her palm on the pommel of her sword, she wraps her fingers around its hilt, ready to pull it out at a moment's notice.
"Alistair, I thought the Grey Wardens passed by here not long ago?" Savreen's question causes Alistair to grimace.
"A few weeks. I don't know how this could have…the only news was that Arl Eamon was tired and a little ill, that he was delayed in heading to Ostagar because of it. Not…I have no idea." This answer is enough for Sav, his honest bewilderment satisfying her for the time being. But Tali can see the anguish on his face after Sav looks away, and she knows he's afraid, thinking of Eamon, the man who raised him.
As they pass the tavern, Tali notices the smell. Charred meat, burnt wood. It's being carried out over Lake Calenhad on the breeze that constantly wafts across the shore, but it is unmistakable. Abarie whimpers, Sher growls. They walk closer, and still the town is almost dead silent, and Tali can now smell burnt fabric and hair. Blood, too, metallic and organic at the same time, heavy and filling her nostrils. She coughs once, trying to get the feeling of breathing it in to cease, but it doesn't work—instead her mouth fills with rancid air, and she keeps it shut after.
"Maker have mercy," Leliana says, and it is then that Tali realizes they have made it to the village square. The smell is as strong as anything here, and its source sits directly in front of them: a massive tower of partly burned and decaying corpses, some skeletal, others almost fresh, others bloated and waterlogged, all horribly mutilated.
"Vashedan," Sten mutters, his usually quiet demeanor cracked by shock. Leliana proceeds to pray quietly, a hand clamped over her nose and mouth. Alistair, eyes wide, finally pulls his sword from its sheath and begins approaching the pile cautiously. Even Morrigan seems perturbed, failing to make any sort of witty comment and instead reaching to her back to pull her staff from its strap.
As Alistair approaches the pile, there is a rattling groan, the click of bone on bone, and a jumble of skeleton and flesh reaches up and out, grasping for him. It happens almost instantly: Alistair shouts in alarm and leaps backwards, and the heap of barely fleshed bones pulls itself from the pile, clambers to its feet. It stands at its full height, a skeleton held together by rotting tendons and the whisper of a living memory. Now freed from the tangled pile of limbs and corpses, it reaches once more for Alistair, and he smacks the arm to the side with his sword. With a bark and a growl, Abarie and Sher begin to circle the thing. Still, it advances, shambling and slow at first but picking up speed. With one hand it swipes at Alistair's face, narrowly missing, and then he is able to kick its legs out from under it, sending it sprawling. Sten moves forward in two massive steps and drives his boot down onto the thing's skull with a sickening squelch, sending papery skin and pulpy brains spraying onto the ground.
"There is something of the demonic at work here," Morrigan warns them all, speaking for the first time since they've arrived in the village. Looking at the remnants of the animated corpse on the ground in front of her, Tali is inclined to believe the witch.
A bell begins ringing somewhere, and the seven of them turn, braced to find more bodies stumbling toward them. Instead, the living stand there, haggard and harried, but very alive.
"Have you come to help us?" one woman asks, voice desperate and quiet as she grips a bucket of lamp oil with white knuckles. The man next to her holds a torch.
"What's happened here?" Ranjit asks the question, oddly enough—Tali had expected Sav to ask, but instead she hangs back a bit, eyes locked on a small hand, a child's hand, exposed and dangling in the pile of bodies. Tali looks away and calls Abarie back to her side, within reach of her hand, which she rests on her head.
"They come from the castle, from the graves," another villager answers, her voice blunt. She holds a pile of wood, and she bends down to situate the logs and branches around the pile. It is only then that Tali notices the other pieces of wood, of tinder and fuel. "Each night. Those that we don't burn rise again the next evening." She has finished with the wood, and she motions for the woman with the bucket of oil to hand it to her. "The mists come down from the castle and fill the valley, and they don't stop until we make them." Oil poured over the pile of corpses, she snaps her fingers, takes the torch from the man's hand as he holds it out to her. "Have you come to help us or not?" When she asks the question a second time, staring at their group with hard eyes, she holds the torch toward the pile—the pyre—until it catches. She takes a few steps and repeats the motion, over and over until the fire takes and the heat begins to ripple off in uncomfortable waves.
The stench now is unbearable. Before, Tali thought it was bad—and it was, to be sure—but now it is worse, dense enough that she thinks if she opened her mouth, she could take a bite of the air, chew it as though it were rancid meat. Tali raises her arm, covers her mouth and nose in the crook of her elbow. The other villagers are praying—reciting Threnodies, perhaps, Tali isn't sure—but the woman with the torch in her hand still stares at them.
"Where is the Arl?" Alistair asks, and he seems shaken. "I was—I passed through here barely a fortnight ago. When did this start? How—" The fire roars, and bone splits, fat and oil popping. Leliana pulls a kerchief from a pocket and covers her own face while Sten stares solemnly into the flames, lips moving as he speaks in a voice too quiet to hear. Tali's stomach turns as she smells fresh hair burn, and she makes the mistake of glancing at the pyre, where she sees the remnants of eyeballs boiling in desiccated skulls. She gags. At her side, Abarie whimpers unhappily, ears flat.
"Maker's breath, Viola," a man's voice rings loud and clear across the square, horrified. The speaker himself enters Tali's frame of view shortly after, hurrying on well-shod feet to usher these newcomers away from the horrible tinder set alight in the village center. "I told you to await the Revered Mother." The reproach is as tired as the man himself appears to be. Medium brown hair, well-combed and kept but tousled, frames a thin and chiseled face, deep-set brown eyes clouded by lack of sleep. His cheekbones are made even sharper by the bruise-like circles under his eyes, and the nostrils of his long, straight nose are flared in distaste, but he is handsome, regal in his bearing.
"The Revered Mother is busy with her charges in the chantry, Bann Teagan," Viola says, eyes fixed on the pyre, gaze cold and far away. "The living need her far more than the dead."
"Bann Teagan?" Savreen asks, pulling her attention toward the man in front of them, turning away from the pyre at last. Her voice causes his brow to crease in bewildered recognition, and then he sees her, and he appears even more confused.
"Lady Savreen Cousland? What—forgive my question, but what are you doing here?" With one last glance toward the pyre, toward Viola and the other villagers, toward the bodies burning away slowly, Sav steps forward and away.
"Perhaps we might speak elsewhere, Bann Teagan."
"Of course, of course. We have fortified the Chantry, if you will accompany me."
He turns, still mystified, and leads them toward on the far side of the village square, up a small path. Next to Tali, Alistair bites his lip furiously, chewing the inside of his cheek. He doesn't seem to notice her glances, nor her attempts to draw his attention, instead remaining absorbed by the back of Bann Teagan's head. He doesn't even notice when Abarie veers to walk closer to him, head cocked in canine concern. Tali can't distract or comfort him as she would like, not as Morrigan looks back quizzically over her shoulder, nor as Leliana's gaze flits about the whole scene, eyes sharp, appraising and inquisitive.
Besides, there's no time, not as they approach the Chantry. A smallish building, its once beautiful windows of stained Serault glass are now boarded up. The ancient stones—the same material as the castle—that make up its walls are cracked with age and pitted by the recent impacts of arrows. Smoke and soot stains those stones that face the square, giving a ghastly indication of the pyres burned in the last few weeks. When Teagan knocks on the doors, the sound of scraping wood can be heard, and slowly, slowly, they open inward, revealing the interior packed full and releasing a wall of noise.
Inside the Chantry, Savreen is relieved to see more villagers alive than there were laid out dead on the pyre, more children that she was able to pick out in her morbid examination of the piled limbs. She follows close behind Teagan as he leads them through the throng of people, most seeming to be grouped with the remnants of their families. There is crying, but there is also chattering, praying, and even a hint of laughter, however tense and forced, performed to keep spirits as high as possible. A small child giggles, babbles and claps, pointing at Sher as he lopes along beside Savreen. The child's father looks up at her with haggard expression, eyes red from tears, and yet he smiles as his child does, mouthing the words 'thank you.' Savreen nods, but looks away quickly, tears pricking at the corner of her vision and stabbing in the back of her throat. Such thanks are impossible for her to accept when they—when she—has done nothing to earn it, when there is so much suffering laid out plain for her to see.
Finally, Teagan pushes open a small door next to the altar, ushering their group into an even smaller rectory, outfitted with a hardly slept in bed and a desk cluttered with freshly drawn maps of the village they've just passed through, choke points and fortifications clearly demarcated/
"My apologies that I am unable to welcome you properly," Teagan says as Sten enters the room, stooped and disgruntled, and nearly collides with Abarie, who yelps and scampers out of the way. For a moment, it seems as though Alistair is almost hiding behind him, though this fails when Teagan notices him and calls him by name—a surprise that is hardly a surprise to Savreen, especially given her conversation with Morrigan that morning. "Alistair? That is you, is it not?" Reluctantly, Alistair steps out in front of Sten, and Savreen cannot help but notice that Teagan looks as though he has seen a ghost. Then his expression warms, his eyes twinkle, and the lack of sleep melts away as a smile creases his face instead of the grooves of exhaustion.
"I suppose the last time you did see me I was…quite a bit smaller, and covered in mud. Although, that is to say, ah, hullo," Alistair says, more than a bit awkwardly. Next to him, Tali's expression is one of barely concealed anxiety and worry, as though she fears for him. Savreen shares a glance with Morrigan, who can barely conceal the glee of being right that threatens to force her lips into a smile. But Savreen finds herself wondering how Alistair could have avoided Teagan when he passed through Redcliffe with the other Wardens so recently. There is more to this secret than just his knowing Teagan, a reason for Alistair to avoid him.
"Covered in mud—Alistair—it is you," Teagan says, no small amount of incredulity in his voice. He steps forward—hesitantly at first, more confidently after his feet find their place—and claps a hand to Alistair's shoulder before drawing the younger man into a hug, his other hand at Alistair's back. There is something so deeply intimate about the gesture, even though that intimacy may be dulled by whatever time has passed. Savreen watches as Alistair stiffens in Teagan's arms, then relaxes, and even embraces him back. All the while, Tali gazes on, eyes shifting, glancing man to man almost as though she expected this.
"Uncle Teagan." There it is. Alistair steps back, uttering the words almost without control, eyes slightly ashamed.
"It—it's been too long, Alistair." Savreen is aware in this moment that perhaps this is not for her to witness, and so she turns ever so slightly, examining instead the carvings that decorate the pillars of the room. Still, though, she listens. Briefly, her eyes meet Tali's, and she sees her cousin doing almost the same thing, studiously engaged in observing anything but Alistair and Teagan. The two men shuffle awkwardly around each other, Alistair more so than Teagan, before Teagan turns back to the others. He examines Tali's armor, Savreen's, and Alistair's, too, eyes lingering on the blue gambesons and the dual griffon sigil emblazoned across each of their chests in varying locations.
"You did not return after you left the Templars for the Wardens, Alistair. You did not even make yourself known when Ser Duncan passed by." The words are phrased somewhere between a question and a statement, containing a multitude of unspoken words, an entire history.
"I—well. I sent letters." Alistair's face is the red color of fired clay, his eyes shifty. Savreen notices his fingers twitch almost imperceptibly in Tali's direction, as though reaching for her. Of course.
"Letters?"
"To Eamon." Teagan seems to think on Alistair's words, his mouth pursing ever so slightly with a hint of displeasure and an even smaller touch of anger. As Savreen glances around the room, attempting to remove her attention from the reunion in front of her, she notices Ranjit watching her. For a moment, she stares back at him. It is, after all, the most surefire way to drown out Alistair and Teagan's words, but soon—too soon—Ranjit breaks her gaze and looks down. Savreen finds herself disappointed—he was never the first to look away before. But that was in a different world, a different lifetime, perhaps three lifetimes ago: before she became a Warden, before the fall of Highever Keep, before she turned from him to the duty she had expected to follow for the rest of her life.
She wants him not to look away. For now, though, it makes her life easier, makes it possible for her to look away herself.
"Forgive me—I did not bring you all here to be privy to a reunion." A blessed interruption to her thoughts, Teagan's apologetic address to the rest of the group finally signals that his conversation with Alistair is at an end, at least for now. Alistair's face, still red, is otherwise impassive. Savreen can't tell if he's embarrassed or upset or angry or happy, but again—it isn't her business. "May I ask your names? And what it is exactly that has brought you here? What little news we received told that all left behind at Ostagar had perished, just as my nephew did." Finally. This is what Savreen is good at. She clears her throat.
"Bann Teagan," she begins, trying not to pay attention to the way Ranjit's eyes linger on her. "You know myself and Alistair. This is my cousin, Talvinder," she motions back towards Tali, "who is also a member of the Grey Wardens. Together with our companions—Sister Leliana, Morrigan, Sten of the Beresaad, and Ran—Ser Gilmore—" she stumbles slightly as she looks at each member of their strange group in turn, finding Ranjit looking directly at her once more. She cannot help but remember the reason and the occasion for her first meeting with Bann Teagan Guerrin of Rainesfere, one in a long line of failed suitors. But she breaks Ranjit's gaze and turns back to the Bann. Continuing her explanation is, after all, far more important than remembrances. There is too much at stake. "Together, we are here to seek an audience with Arl Eamon, on behalf of the Grey Wardens."
Teagan sighs, the exhaustion from before returning to his features.
"If it is an audience with my brother that you seek," he says, turning toward the table of maps and leaning forward, palms spread wide across it, "then you have come at an ill time. Eamon took to his bed with a sickness just before he was to leave for Ostagar."
"Duncan said he felt unwell when they spoke," Alistair interjects, brow creased and knotted. Teagan nods, rubbing a hand across his forehead and rubbing his temples.
"It was hardly three days after Duncan left that Eamon was struck with fever and delusion. We thought it a simple ill air of late summer until then. We received scattered news of Ostagar, and then Eamon fell into sleep and wouldn't wake. The next night, the corpses rose. And so it has been since." Savreen frowns. The timeline is tight and hard to understand, and yet it feels as though there is too much coincidence to it. She recalls the way Cailan had brushed aside Eamon's offer of help should he only wait a little longer to stage an assault—it should dissuade her from the fear of conspiracy growing in her mind. But she also remembers the way Loghain had argued against waiting—for the Orlesians, true, but to wait for the Orlesians would have meant also to wait for Eamon's men.
It is a jumble, the untangling of which will not help them in this moment.
"Has no one been able to enter the castle?" Teagan shakes his head, clearly frustrated.
"An attempt was made. It was unsuccessful." Such a small word, but so dreadful. Savreen recalls the blood drying on the portcullis lever. "There is another way to enter the castle, but I am unable to leave the villagers, or take their protectors from them to accompany me. A small contingent of my brother's knights was sent out after he fell ill, and it is those I have managed to call back who aid us now. But that contingent grows ever smaller, night by night." Here he pauses, looking down at the table, at the maps, at the dirt and blood caught in his fingernails. "How important is it that you speak with Eamon?" Savreen knows where this is headed, and so she speaks as plainly and simply as possible.
"It is our only choice." Teagan nods without looking up.
"Then I regret that I must ask for your aid here, first. You will not be able to enter the castle without my help, and I am unable to leave the people of the village without protection." Finally, now, he looks up, eyes stony and resolute. "We each have something the other needs to accomplish your ultimate goal."
"Indeed." He has backed them into a corner, and while Savreen does not like his maneuvering, neither does she like the idea of leaving the villagers as pawns. And besides, Teagan's goal is to do his duty, and for that, she cannot fault him, no matter how politically inclined he might be in the doing. "It seems we must help each other, then." Behind her, Morrigan lets out a little scoff and a grumble, but otherwise holds her tongue. Out of the corner of her eye, Savreen can see Sten crossing his arms, nodding in approval. The only emotion on Teagan's face when he looks up is pure relief.
"I thank you," he says, his voice slightly hoarse. Perhaps Savreen had been a little unkind to assume his motivations political, his actions one of maneuver and manipulation, when he is so clearly desperate. But he collects himself quickly, shoving away that desperation and pushing himself back up to his full height before clapping his hands together. "Time is short. It may be only noon, but the afternoon hours will pass quickly. We must be prepared when darkness falls. May I ask—I would delegate members of your party to assist my men and my brother's knights about the village, but I do not wish to usurp—" Savreen waves her hand.
"You usurp nothing, Bann Teagan." He inclines his head.
"In that case, may I request that yourself and Alistair remain with me, while the others of your group seek out the leader of the village defense?" A brief glance at the others reveals their dislike for this plan. Tali, Savreen can see, is disgruntled to be the only Warden excluded from whatever planning is about to take place. Ranjit hides his feelings well, but Savreen knows he would rather stay, too. She does not dare hope or think about his reasons. She does not. She will not.
"Talvinder," Savreen calls to her cousin, who meets her gaze with a faint pout. It makes Savreen want to smile for a moment—the familiarity of it, of Tali being told to do something she would rather not—but she cannot, not here, not now. "Perhaps you might take charge?" That seems to perk her up a bit, and with a nod and a decidedly less frustrated expression, Tali clears her throat and places a hand on her sword, approaching Teagan to ask a question.
"Where are we needed?" He flashes her a slightly relieved, if tight, smile—it hardly reaches his eyes.
"Ser Perth commands my brother's knights. He will be able to tell you more. Look for him by the smithy, on the other side of the village square." Tali gives him a little bow and turns to go, looking to Savreen one last time before she gestures for the others to follow her, Abarie at her heels. Once Leliana has crossed the threshold, the door shuts behind them, and Savreen is left with Alistair, Teagan, and Sher, standing in silence but for the mabari's faint panting.
"Is there more you can't say in front of others, Bann Teagan?" The question may be blunt, but Savreen would rather ask it than wonder and discover later, at a worse time. Teagan sighs, glancing to Alistair, and then back to Savreen.
"No one in the castle has sent word of any kind since the corpses rose. My brother's wife, my nephew, none of those knights who remained, none of the servants who live in the village—no one. It has been silent as a tomb." Savreen isn't quite sure what to say, and when she looks to Alistair, he looks even less sure.
"Bann Teagan—"
"Please, Lady Savreen, you may call me Teagan."
"Teagan," the name alone feels strange on her tongue, and she cannot help but think of Ranjit, but she continues on. "Are you…quite sure they still live?" His shoulders sag slightly, but he recovers as quickly as possible—quicker even than Savreen thinks she might have.
"They have not been among the corpses yet."
"Then there is a chance they live." It is part question, but mostly reassurance. Teagan appreciates it, that much is clear. But the lull in conversation reminds Savreen of Morrigan's words, her warning and unease. There is no easy way to ask Teagan about it. She looks over at Alistair once more, finding him chewing the inside of his lip. He meets her eye, and Savreen wishes he would say something, anything. I don't know what you know, she wants to yell at him, I don't know him like you do. Stop the pretense of patheticism and take the lead. But she doesn't. Instead, she stares at him, hard, until he looks to Teagan and clears his throat. Miraculously, though, and to his credit, he asks the right question.
"Is there a chance the corpses could have been raised by someone inside the castle?" With a sigh, Teagan leans back, dropping into a chair. He looks to the ceiling as he answers, hands clasped between his legs, and for a moment, he looks young and alone.
"I have asked myself the same question. It is…it is the only conclusion that makes sense." Savreen nods. He is right, after all. It is the only possible conclusion. They fall silent once more, contemplating the situation, until Alistair speaks again.
"So what's the plan, then?"
Talvinder doesn't grudge being sent to help the others while Sav and Alistair remain in Teagan's makeshift study. She doesn't grudge that Bann Teagan hadn't even acknowledged that maybe she should stay, as a Grey Warden. Perhaps that's a lie she's telling herself, but it does help her feel less irritable, so what does it matter, really? Besides, she's got to figure out how to pair off this disparate group of followers who haven't exactly all taken a shine to each other. That's far more pressing in the moment than her feelings on being included.
Especially since all that they've done is walk into the transept from the small rectory and already Leliana and Morrigan are dangerously near to arguing.
"It is good that we are able to stay and help," Leliana says, hopeful and chipper. Sten is silent behind her, but Morrigan scoffs in the back of her throat.
"Yes, 'tis very good indeed that that man manipulated us off our present course to go and run errands for him."
"Are you always to be so cruel, Morrigan?" The expression on Leliana's face is one a person might have if they tasted soured milk, and Tali has an urge to groan and shove her head into her hands. At least when Alistair and Morrigan argue, it's funny.
"Are you always to be so naïve and foolish?"
"At least I am not cynical and self-interested."
"'Tis not cynical to remember that which rests upon our shoulders!" Morrigan raises her voice now, and a number of the villagers camped out in the nave and south transept of the Chantry turn to look at them all. With a sigh of frustration, Tali tries to get a word in edgewise, to silence the argument, but Morrigan is not finished, turning to address her instead, an electric fire glittering gold in her eyes. "You of all people should remember that which you carry. 'Death follows your every step'—or have you forgotten my mother's warning already?"
The argument stills as Tali feels as though snow has been poured down the back of her shirt, icy dread making the hair raise on the back of her neck and even on her arms under her armor. In truth, she had forgotten Flemeth's words to her, lost them in the wash of everything else. But now they crash over her again, and she sees Morrigan's point, even if she doesn't agree. If death truly does follow them all, then what time have they to spend here?
No—she can't think like that. She won't.
"You're right," she says simply, heart hammering in her chest. Why does diffusing this argument fill her with such trepidation? "You're right, Morrigan. We need to remember what—what we're doing." She pauses, swallows. "But we need allies. Allies we can only get by helping Bann Teagan. If his brother is dead, if anything has happened to the Arl, he is the one who will help us rally against Loghain. We need him." Morrigan's face tells Tali that she is unconvinced. Tali continues, the words feeling more natural. She is in charge, after all. And she knows Morrigan well enough. She can do this. It is not so hard. "You say he manipulated us off course. That may be so, I can't speak to his intention. But he is not the only one manipulating the pieces on the board."
With narrowed eyes, Morrigan thinks on Tali's words. The anxiety returns—did she say the wrong thing? But after a brief moment, Morrigan nods and folds her arms across her chest.
"Very well." It is the lack of disgruntled anger in her tone that tells Tali that she has successfully convinced Morrigan; it is the way her posture has relaxed that tells Tali that Morrigan might even respect Tali's words. Talvinder sighs once more, rubbing her eyelids furiously until she sees sparks. At least she can stop Morrigan from disemboweling Leliana, it would seem. That is a point in her favor as a leader, no matter what else.
"We should head—"
"Excuse me—excuse me." A voice, tired but insistent, distracts Talvinder once more, and she turns to the side, where a woman stands, roughly shoulder height, looking up at her. The woman is a pretty one, with a long nose and statuesque features, but like so many others, tiredness rests like a patina over every inch of her skin, turning it even paler beneath the shock of faded freckles across her cheeks. She grimaces slightly, and moves a hand to rest it on her belly, and it's only then that Tali sees that she's heavily pregnant. After a moment of breathing slowly in and out, the woman speaks again. "Forgive me—he has been so restless lately. I must ask: you are Wardens?" With her free hand, the woman gestures to the blue of Tali's gambeson, the griffons emblazoned into her armor.
"I am, yes?" Confusion, and no small amount of anxiety, form her answer into something unsure. The woman nods, brushing light brown hair from her face and tucking it behind her ear, where it promptly slides free once more.
"My name is Helena. I—I must ask—" here, Helena's voice cracks slightly, beginning to tremble— "My husband, we came to visit his family here, and he—he left with the Wardens before. He—I have heard—his name is Jory—perhaps you may know—we know only whispers of—of Ostagar—" Tali feels bile rise in her throat, sweat rising to her palms as she remembers the sight of Jory's face, dead and bloody, on the stone next to her. Helena looks at her insistently, with fearful eyes, and Tali can hear nothing, nothing at all, not as she struggles not to vomit. She turns to the others, eyes wide. Where is Sav? Sav would know what to say. Sav always knows what to say. But she is not here, and Tali doesn't know, and Helena is looking at her, and the fear is turning into tears as Tali's silence answers her question.
With a shuddering breath, Helena turns and stumbles, sitting heavily down on the steps up to the altar. She seems so young, sitting on the floor, a hand splayed behind her, the other on her belly, so young and so lost, despite the fact that she's likely several years older than Tali. Without thinking, feeling just one goal in her mind, Tali kneels next to Helena. She takes Helena's hand in hers, and as Helena looks up at her, she finally knows what to say.
"He loved you dearly. He died trying to return to you." The tears turn to sobs, and Helena crushes Tali's hand in her grip. "I know…I can't say anything that will make the pain stop. And I didn't know him for very long. But I will promise you, by the grace of all above and all the powers to which we belong, we will end this. And whatever my power may be to protect you, I—we, the Wardens, will provide."
Unexpectedly, Helena throws her arms around Tali's shoulders. She wails, and Talvinder wishes she had given Jory more of a chance, wishes she had spoken to him more, wishes she had been kinder to him. Whatever his faults, he deserved a better end. It is that realization that drives Tali to hold the crying woman gently, to wrap her own arms around Helena. There is something about having survived Jory that makes Tali feel beholden to his wife, responsible as she's never felt before, a more real and tangible notion of the abstract thoughts of responsibility over the people of her family's teyrnir.
But this woman represents all that made flesh in a way that Tali cannot escape. She is here in front of Tali, and Tali will do whatever she can, whatever is needed.
Before too long, Helena quiets, leans back, wipes her eyes. She mutters an apology, but Tali refuses to accept it.
"My words are my oath, Helena." It is all she can say. The woman nods, and wordlessly, she stands. As though nothing had passed, she turns back to the cots laid out in the nave, leaving Talvinder sitting on the steps of the altar, Leliana and Morrigan and Sten and Ranjit about her. Blessedly, Morrigan says nothing. Tali stands, clears her throat. They have spent enough time here—there is much to do.
"We will find the knight," she says, and her voice is clear and high as she draws herself to her full height, "and we will do what is needed." None of them challenge her, and with a new purpose, Tali leads them out of the Chantry.